


Snapshots

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Memphis Belle (1990)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-12-22
Updated: 2004-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-25 08:50:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1642493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for Keiko Kirin</p>
    </blockquote>





	Snapshots

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Keiko Kirin

 

 

2  
The war has changed him. Or perhaps woken him up. Except he also feels as though the war is a vivid dream, the most vivid he's ever had, and at some point he'll wake up and lose these guys to memories. Danny tries to capture this new intensity of feeling in his journal, but his fumbling attempts frustrate him. It's easier with the camera. He can't capture their voices or their thoughts, so he'll make do with a blurry image, in the end, he sometimes thinks, just as imperfect as human memory.

The war has made everything sharper and harsher, but he still can't get the words to sound right. He's never felt more alive, and his words are just as dead as ever.

This matters much less to him now than it did in college. Now there's more to him than his words, than the poetry he gathers around himself. He is part of something fierce and just. He loves these guys so much and he doesn't want the war to end, and he doesn't want any of them to die, and he doesn't want any of them to leave. He tries not to think about the future. He tries not to love them too much. More often than not, he fails.

5  
Eugene has always wanted to know someone like Jack. Someone with a foul mouth, someone violently different from the guys at St. Peter's. The funny thing is, he hadn't even realized that until he met Jack. Eugene curses now, plays tricks when he can think of them, feels like he has a friend.

If Eugene were to be completely honest with himself, he'd also admit that sometimes he thinks Jack doesn't like him. Though Eugene has blossomed under Jack's rough tutelage, he's still an amateur compared to Jack. Jack's always playing these mean-spirited games, and Eugene's always falling for them, because he's never known anyone like Jack before.

6  
Danny is someone Clay's never met before. Clay wants to touch Danny, always, and in the strangest places. Like the nape of his neck, pale and freckled. Clay's afraid of how much he wants to touch Danny, so he doesn't let himself do it very often. While they're playing football, maybe. Or when Clay's bumming a smoke. Clay makes sure to drape his arm across Danny's shoulders as casually as Rascal does.

The rest of the time, Clay stays away from Danny, far away, because he doesn't trust himself. He's pretty sure he shouldn't, since in his bunk at night, he tries to figure the odds of Danny touching him back.

9  
Furniture making is easy, compared to this. Dennis has always taken pride in his skill and dedication to the craft, but the fact remains. Furniture making is not a matter of life or death, unlike the business of flying a B-17 over enemy territory. Dennis realized this quickly coming into the war and was shocked that most of the other men didn't seem to pay that basic fact much mind. So Dennis takes particularly careful steps. He tries his best to protect all his guys, from each other and from themselves. He focuses completely on keeping the guys safe, keeping them a team, as he tells them often. Privately he considers them more of a family. Dennis hopes the guys realize how much he appreciates and loves them, because Dennis wouldn't be able to find the energy or words to let them know sufficiently.

Especially not with Luke doing his best to break Dennis. Dennis knows he drives Luke crazy. Luke is able to get under Dennis's skin, too, and lately Dennis has had to try harder to stay focused and calm. Luke baits him, insults him. Sometimes it goes the opposite way, and Dennis thinks he's getting too much pleasure out of baiting Luke, out of seeing the exasperation flood Luke's face, hearing the biting frustration in Luke's voice. Dennis likes that much better than the hellfire grin Luke more often wears. Sometimes Dennis feels that the frustration is all his, a gift from Luke, who expends energy on getting Dennis to not take everything so seriously, to have a little fun.

The problem is, Dennis is always at attention. He can't drop his guard for a second, because the guys are depending on him to get them out alive. He can't be whatever it is that Luke wants him to be.

12  
Sometimes Danny can feel Clay's gaze, just as tangible as Rascal's arm slung companionably over Danny's shoulder. `Danny Boy,' Clay has christened him, and now the rest of them have taken it up. Danny wishes he could write the way Clay's voice makes him feel.

21  
The only times Phil isn't aware of the low-level fear is when Val's mouth is on his cock. Then Phil is overcome with a kind of euphoric terror. The first time was after their fifth mission, when the Memphis Belle had managed to come through unscathed yet again, even though that mission had resulted in the worst casualties. After they landed, walked away, Phil found himself wishing that he had died up there. At least then the fear would be gone. He wouldn't have to force himself through the rest of the day and night, wouldn't have to wait for the fear to ebb enough for him to almost ignore it, only to have it seep over him again in the morning, on the way to debrief. He thought he might go crazy if he had to keep living with the fear.

Val hadn't said anything, just shoved him up against the wall. Phil's first wild thought was that Val was attacking him. Then, when Val dropped to his knees and began yanking at Phil's pants, Phil had thought that perhaps Val could smell it on him. Perhaps everyone knew that Phil was like this, wanted this. And then Val managed to stuff most of Phil's cock in his mouth, and Phil's last coherent thought was, "Danny."

That surprised him, but thank god nothing more than a muffled grunt came out when Val gripped Phil's hip hard with one hand. Phil came more from the fingers digging into ass than Val's determined sucking, but that was nothing to complain about. And Phil could pretty much complain about anything. Val stood and wiped his mouth, discreetly turning to rebutton his trousers. Phil hastily stuffed himself back into his pants. Val didn't look at him as he left, and the fear came flooding back, though at least this time Phil had something with which to distract himself.

It seems like Val knows when the fear is about to overwhelm Phil. Each time Phil feels on the verge of turning into a gibbering idiot, a screaming disgrace, Val looks at him, and Phil knows that at some point over the next few hours, Phil will have his back against stone or brick, and all he will able to focus on will be the slick, slightly rough heat of Val's mouth, each time burning hotter. But Phil has an added fear now, of what he will do when Val's mouth is not enough.

 

 

 


End file.
